A Long Walk Alone In The Dark
by Random-Battlecry
Summary: The scene in the airplane bathroom goes a little differently. One shot, for those of you who thought there would be a little more LisaJackson romance.


**A/N: One shot. Scene adapted for my own purposes. There's no backstory or anything, so you probably have to have seen the movie already to get what's going on.**

**A Long Walk Alone In the Dark**

She had thought immediately upon sighting him that he was too pretty for his own good. Straight dark brown hair framed his face, hiding his ears from view, accentuating the slanted planes of his cheekbones, providing a stark background for his icy eyes. She'd never seen eyes like that; they made her shiver, for two very different reasons simultaneously.

One of the reasons was fear.

The other— wasn't. This in itself frightened her more.

She was trying not to think of how he'd smiled at her when he asked her to have a drink with him, trying not to think of how his voice behind her had caused the hair on the back of her neck to raise, trying not to think of the slight brush of his hand now against her skin, as he pushed her hair away from her face so he could see her expression.

"You do comprehend what I'm saying," he said.

"I know what you're saying."

"It's a clear choice, I would think."

"Yes," she said softly, "I suppose to you, it would seem so."

Her eyes were fixed on the back of the seat in front of her; dark and heavy with sadness. He flicked his gaze from them to the window beside her; nothing could be seen now but clouds, as they climbed their way higher into the sky. His startlingly blue eyes concentrated on the oval opening into space, he spoke quietly, his lips just below her ear. "You love your father, I know it. Talk to him every day, sometimes twice. Call him Daddy, even when there's people around to hear— no sense of embarrassment about your connection with him. I admire that, actually, I really do. Not a lot of grown, professional women would do that." His eyes slid back to her face once more, and one slender hand grasped her chin, turned her face towards him. "Although," he went on, raising an eyebrow slightly and speaking slowly and distinctly, "with your track record as far as boyfriends go, I couldn't really call you a 'professional woman,' now, could I?" She flinched under his concentrated regard. "Or perhaps _too_ professional," he amended thoughtfully. "Married to your job—"

"Its no concern of yours." She tried to turn from him, but he kept her chin held in his hand, fingers digging into her flesh as she fought; when she relaxed, he did as well, but kept his grasp on her. Showing ownership, she thought, and shuddered at the concept. She couldn't turn away from him, but she didn't have to look at him, either— her gaze dropped away from him and she focused on his kneecap. Anything so she didn't have to look into those eyes.

"But it is of some concern to me," he contradicted, his eyes still on her and a slight smile creasing his lips. "So long watching you— I probably know you better than you know yourself. I doubt you could say anything, do anything, think anything that would come as a surprise to me. At this phase in our relationship, if I were the husband and you were the wife, I'd have left you for a more exciting woman. 'You don't surprise me any more,' I'd say. Then I'd advise you to stop in at Victoria's Secret and put forth an effort for once."

His tone was facetious, and he was clearly enjoying her discomfort. She swallowed hard, and felt slightly violated that his hand had crept down her throat so he could feel the motion, feel the beat of her pulse— which had grown betrayingly faster. She gulped again and wondered hopelessly if perhaps he wouldn't notice.

Her eyes slipped upwards slowly, up the stretch of his trousers to his hips and waist, up his arm to his far shoulder, then focused gradually on his face: chin first, slightly parted lips, the crease that indicated a smile just to one side of them, those eyes—

"Then I'd take your advice, serve you dinner in lingerie, and let you know afterwards, as I see you froth at the mouth and twitch and moan, that I'd poisoned the spaghetti."

The smile crept further across his face, and she was forced to blink back tears once more— she was sick of crying. "Not a problem," he said. "I don't eat Italian food."

For a split second, his quirk of a smile was reflected in a flicker of her eyes; then she took advantage of his distraction to wrench her face out of his grasp. His fingernails scored light red lines in her skin, and she lurched away from him, one hand covering the scratches.

He watched her a moment more.

"You really have to accept the fact that I want what's best for you, in the end," he said. "I'm not against you, per se, or even your father. You are simply a means to an end."

She shook her head, the lump in her throat rising again and making it impossible to speak. He tilted his head, eyes drawing slowly to her neck, just below her ear, admiring the skin. "You're not going to start crying again, are you?" he whispered into the hollow of her collar bone.

She was shaking; he could feel it against his cheek, and then against his lips.

"I need to use the bathroom," she said, fighting her voice out from somewhere deep inside. It emerged deep and strange and strangled-sounding.

"I can't let you do that."

"When you gotta go, you gotta go," she said, consciously imitating the light tone he would occasionally take, as though this was nothing more than a lover's tiff and any moment they would kiss and make up. She leaned away from him, at the same time turning and fixing him with her eyes, as if she could make him move simply by the force of her gaze.

He thought for a moment, and sighed. "Well, what can you do," he said, and stood up.

She slipped past him, doing her best not to touch him any more than she had to; but something there was warm against her, sheer body heat a reminder that he was just as human as she was. His warmth belied the ice in his eyes.

She walked quickly down the aisle, glancing back over her shoulder; he stood there, dark and inscrutable, his eyes inhuman, betraying something purely animal within. She wondered why she couldn't see that when they first met, why something about him didn't tip her off that his whole manner was wrong. She wondered why she was still drawn to him, when he'd threatened to kill her father, when he'd hurt her and demeaned her and that _horrible, horrible smirk— _

Escape.

If she'd had a parachute, she'd have jumped off the plane. She wanted nothing more than to get away.

—perhaps not _nothing_ more—

Forcing this line of thought away from her, she marched into the bathroom, closing the door behind her and slamming the catch home. She moved quickly to the basin, turned on the water and splashed handfuls of it over her face, trying to dash away the traces of tears. When she looked up, stared into the mirror at her own reflection, she began to understand suddenly— to comprehend that, yes, it was her that these things were happening to. It was her who was trapped in the clutches of the assassin— or whatever it was he did, whatever function he fulfilled in the underworld. And it was her that felt this strange compulsion deep within, dark and newborn, undoubtedly born of desperation and violence— she wanted him at her mercy, helpless, to beg forgiveness, she wanted him—

_Dear God._

She clutched at her forehead and gazed angrily at her reflection. She was ridiculous and she was stupid and she wanted out, out, out—

When the thought struck her, it was but the work of a moment to put it into action. Soap— and water— and words, frantic words—

She finished, scrubbed the soap off her hands, and, somewhat numbly, ran them under the dryer for a minute. Not daring to glance at what she'd done, she stepped to the door and opened it.

Ice-blue eyes stared directly into hers.

"I was beginning to worry that—"

His gaze lighted on the message on the mirror. As she saw his face change, she tried to force the door shut, but he pushed her back against the wall, fought his way in and slammed the door behind him, pushing the lock home. He turned on her immediately, one arm catching her under the throat and lifting her up, the other fumbled briefly at her shoulder and down her breasts before finding purchase, fingers hooked through her waistband. He bore down on her, pressed his body against hers to aid in holding her up against the wall, feet a half inch above the floor, dangling, kicking uselessly. He was too close for her to kick him. He was too close for her to do anything.

"And here I thought you'd fallen in," he sneered, lips a scant few centimeters from her own. "I should have known better than to trust you even this far. Stop struggling— the more you struggle, the closer I get to choking you to death and disguising it as a grief-induced suicide. Nothing links me to you, Lisa— I'd have no compulsions against it other than what I need you to do for me."

She tried to speak, but couldn't do more than move her lips. He'd cut off her air once again, his arm, rock hard with muscle, pressing against her throat.

"I've given you chances," he whispered harshly. "I give you one more. If you love your father, Lisa, then for God's sake _stop gambling with his life_."

She went still then, and began to cry; she'd already wept so much in the past few hours that all that resulted was contortions of her face, heavings of her chest as she tried to control her dry tears. His eyes narrowed at her, he leaned closer, hands moving once more to new positions. His arm released its place on her neck, allowing her to gulp in deep breaths of air, and slipped down to press on her waist; his other hand slipped back up her torso, fingers dancing delicately just on the surface of her clothes, as he noticed something which intrigued him.

He pushed the collar of her shirt back and smoothed his fingers over the scar that was revealed just underneath her collarbones.

"Someone did that to you?" he inquired. She was startled to find that his voice was no longer smooth, that somehow he seemed to have been just as disturbed by this— all this, the violence and the close proximity and everything— as she was. "Someone cut you there, someone took the perfection of your skin—"

She didn't dare speak; as his hands moved gently at the opening of her shirt, she knew that even with his grasp off her throat, her voice would come breathless and broken. Too close— he's too close—

He leaned closer yet, tipping his head to one side to examine the thick white scar, finger still exploring the skin around it. She thought, crazily, that if anyone came in right now it would look remarkably like a teenaged make-out session. The catch in her breath amounted to a groan as his fingers slipped back down her body, and his eyes flicked up to hers once more.

"That's how life goes, Lisa," he said. "You can be utterly, utterly perfect, and someone takes it from you. Someone screws with your life. Someone takes your joy. And all you can do is pay them back. Revenge is sweet, they say. Revenge is everything."

"Personal experience?" she managed to suggest, though her attempt at a light tone of voice failed miserably.

Once again, the slight smile, and he pressed even closer.

"I'm sorry for this," he said, and he was apologizing to her scarred skin, to the one perfection that she had once had. His lips traced the white line, caressed with a gentleness that was totally alien to what she knew of him. She felt the tip of his tongue follow it there, felt him relishing the violence that once was, exulting in the marred, twisted skin of that part of her body, and she shuddered.

Her breath left her, her head hit the wall behind her with a thump as his fingers unexpectedly bit deep into her waist and just beneath her breasts, and he shoved closer to close his lips around the scar, pushing and pulling at it with his breath, then releasing and admiring the glistening skin with half-closed eyes. A scrape of his teeth along her collar bone, chasing the strange feeling with his tongue, brushing his lips upwards along her neck till he found her jawline, deep pulls on her skin with his mouth, till he paused, lips held just over hers, their eyes locked together as they stared each other down.

His hands released their grips and took up new ones around her wrists, and he stepped away, towards the door.

"Someday," she said, voice still ragged and catching in her throat, "I _will_ pay you back."

"Revenge is sweet," he reiterated, and the smile left his mouth and crept, for the first time, to his eyes. "When we get out of this, I may have to steal you."

It was the knowledge that he did not say things lightly that chilled her as he tugged her back out into the seating area; and it was the knowledge that this amounted to a promise of infinitely more that warmed her again as she sat once again. He was delayed behind her for a moment; she heard disgusted murmurs, then his footsteps as he slid into the seat beside her with a sigh as though he'd gotten in from a long day's work dealing with exceptionally stupid people.

"This changes nothing," she said, eyes focused ahead.

"I agree entirely," he said smoothly.

She turned to her right, towards the window. She could see his reflection in it, and he was looking at her again, eyes once more impassive and cool as glaciers. She concentrated on breathing, and directed her gaze past the window, into the blank darkness of the air outside.


End file.
